So you've just captured a wizard, a fairy, a spirit, a ghost, maybe Superman or even a god. Congratulations! Now how do you keep them from escaping? Ordinary rope or handcuffs won't do the trick, they could just use magic to make them come undone or maybe just break them or pass right through them. What you need are special restraints that are either so strong nothing short of the universe collapsing can break them, or the restraints somehow counteract the prisoners' powers, rendering them harmless as long as they're bound by the restraints.

This trope covers ropes, chains, handcuffs, shackles, straitjackets, and other things along those lines which are capable of holding these extraordinary beings without them being able to get out of them.

Examples

Bleach anime, "Soul Society/The Rescue" arc episode 45. After Ganju, Uryu and Chad are captured by the Soul Society, manacles are put on them that seal off their spiritual pressure and prevent them from using their powers.

Rather common in Hellboy and B.P.R.D. when dealing with demons. When attempting a summoning, anyone with half an ounce of sense will use some magical binding or words of power to prevent the demon from leaving the summoning circle. (Of course, anyone with a full ounce of sense wouldn't be summoning demons in the first place, because things always manage to go wrong even with these barriers in place.)

Doctor Strange uses a "Crimson Bands of Cyttorak" spell to tie up superpowered evildoers, and the Hulk when he's rampaging..

In Wreck-It Ralph after Vanellope is captured by King Candy and thrown in his Fungeon she's shown in an enormous shackle labeled "100% glitch-proof".

Who Framed Roger Rabbit. After Judge Doom captures the Toons Jessica and Roger Rabbit, he has the weasels tie them up with escape-proof Toon rope.

After Hades assaults Olympus in Hercules, the gods are shown being led away in chains, which vanish rather than fall off after Herc cuts them.

Obi-Wan Kenobi, when captured by Count Dooku in Star Wars: Attack of the Clones, is held captive, suspended in midair in a containment field that also rotated him slowly. It has several features designed to make Jedi less able to use the Force to escape.

In Hellboy, Rasputin binds Hellboy in stocks and chains inscribed with Hellboy's true name. The only way for Hellboy to break these bindings is to say his name, tacitly submitting to his destiny as Prince of Hell and bringer of the apocalypse. Of course, making Hellboy fulfill this destiny is Rasputin's entire goal.

When Artemis is captured in The Titan's Curse, she's briefly shackled before being forced to take Atlas' place holding up the sky.

In The Emperor's Soul, Shai is bound with chains made of ralkalest metal, preventing her from Forging the shackles to make them defective. Interestingly, ralkalest is a fairly weak metal, so if she'd really wanted to, Shai could probably have Forged tools to break the chains.

This happens in The Riftwar Cycle: When Milamber is captured by the Tsurani, he must be bound. However, being Milamber, there is no way that even magic can bind him. he promptly escapes.

At least twice in The Dresden Files: the troll-made anti-magic spiky cuffs and Harry's unicorn-hair binding that works on a red half-vampire.

In the Star Trek Expanded Universe series The Q-Continuum, an old enemy of Q's is unleashed and traps him aboard the Enterprise, which manifests itself as a pair of leg irons. Later he finds himself in the ship's hydroponics bay trying to pick them with a cactus needle.

Subverted in an episode of Wonder Woman when after being caught by Nazis, she's wrapped in chains that had survived being tested by teams of elephants. For a while she just sits there as they monologue, but when the time comes she breaks the chains easily.

In Norse Mythology, the gods had the dwarves create a magical chain called Gleipnir to bind the mighty wolf Fenrir. To make Gleipnir impossible to break (at least until Ragnarok), it was made of six impossible things: the sound of a cat's footfall, the beard of a woman, the roots of a mountain, the sinews of a bear, the breath of a fish and the spittle of a bird.

Several Champions adventures had superpowered devices that were used by villains to prevent captured heroes from escaping. One applied a backlash attack to any character that used their superpowers to try to escape it.

In the Forgotten Realms setting the gods bet Kezef the Chaos Hound, an expy of Fenrir, that they could forge a chain that would hold him. Gond, god of craftsmen, forged the chain and buried its anchor miles deep in the rock of Pandemonium, and Mystra, goddess of magic, wrapped him in a self-repairing magical curtain. The two traps successfully held Kezef for millennia until he was freed by one of Cyric's plots.

Basic D&D adventure IM2 The Wrath of Olympus. A group of Immortals (minor deities) illegally interferes on the Prime Plane. The forces of Entropy capture them and secure them with chains that not only render them helpless but drain their internal power (Life Energy) as well.

Basic D&D supplement The Book of Marvelous Magic. Irons are magical confinement devices combining manacles (wrists) and shackles (ankles). The Irons of Imprisonment can only be broken by a Wish spell or a blow from a plus 4 or better weapon.

On each mission of Carmen Sandiego: The Great Chase Through Timethe detective is given a set of time cuffs. It's never really specified why special cuffs are needed but they need to be activated before nabbing the perp. Presumably they keep them from drifting off into the timestream, or something.

In World of Warcraft a quest line investigating Defias activity in Dustwallow Marsh yielded enchanted shackles from the wreckage of a ship, which indicated it had been transporting the king of Stormwind.

On Fate/stay night and Fate/Zero one of Archer's Noble Phantasms is Enkidu, a special chain that was created to restrain the gods, its strenght is proportional to the divinity of their oponent, so while it can easily overpower gods, when used against normal person, it simply acts as a tough chain.

Looking for Group: There's at least two occasions where the Warlock, Richard has his powers limited by enchanted shackles after being captured. In the second case we're shown that some of the enchanted shackles can be used to control Richard's body by commanding him to do something.

In Digger, the dead god underground is bound by chains made by dwarfs of impossible things, in a probable shout out to Norse Mythology. In order to make sure the chains are also proof against mundane threats such as earthquakes or lockpicks, a wombat is also hired as a consultant.

Lycanthropes when they transform can easily break bonds meant for humans so their cuffs must be much stronger.

Banshee restraints cover their hands completely so they can't fire their heat beams.

Project Cadmus in Justice League Unlimited develops special handcuffs to hold the superpowered members of the League. However, on the only occasion they actually get to use them, the President calls it off and admits to doubting these cuffs would hold the Leaguers, anyway.

An episode of the animated Bibi Blocksberg had the eponymous witch attempt to conjure a set of ropes to capture an evil wizard, but he sends her spell right back at her, leaving her wrapped up in her own ropes which, being magical, can't be untied by hand, they have to be burned off.

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